Rome- Day 3

On our last day in Rome, we slept in and headed to the National Museum of Rome.  I wish I would have known more about Roman history to truly appreciate this museum, but the fact that some of the statues were almost perfectly preserved from over 2000 years ago was pretty amazing.

Then we went and got lunch- Ravioli. Yum!  We wandered around and windowshopped until the Capucin Crypt opened.  The Capucin crypt was ridiculous.  Someone literally took the bones of 4000 dead monks and built stuff out of them.  We couldn’t take pictures, but I found this one online.

If you can’t tell, that’s all bones.  Everything was made out of bones.  Even the chandeliers. 

Then we went to find Santa Maria in Testavere church.  It was time for mass, so we stayed for mass and then wandered the church.  The ceiling was my favorite part. 

We ate dinner, ran back to our hostel to grab our bags, and headed to the airport.  We went to try to catch the airport shuttle, but we couldn’t find it.  We ended up taking a taxi.  We got to the airport around midnight, only to find out it is closed from midnight till 4:30 am.  I don’t know why an airport would close, but whatever.  We hung out all night at the airport because our flight was supposed to leave at 6am.  We got checked in, met up with our friends because we were flying back together, only to find out our flight was delayed till 12:50.  I had two presentations on Monday and was not ready for either of them because I was planning on working on them once I got home.  They ended up going well, but I was stressed out about getting them done.  We finally made it back to Alcala, and I’d never been so happy to be back!

Rome- Day 2

On our second day in Rome, we got up early, took showers and were off to meet our friends at Castel St. Angelo.  We got there about 45 minutes later than we planned on… oops.  Luckilly, our friends were running late too.  The castle was alright, but it had a great view of St. Peter’s.

Oh, and it was gross and rainy all day.

Regardless, it was time for the Vatican!  We grabbed a little pizza snack and then headed to St. Peter’s.  When we got to St. Peter’s square, we were bombarded with people trying to get us to pay for guided tours.  The said the line would take 3 hours and then another hour after security.  Well, they were totally lying, and I’m glad I didn’t waste my money on a guided tour.  We got through the line in about a half hour.  We went quickly through the crypt, and then into St. Peter’s.  It was AMAZING.  The pictures don’t do it justice at all.  It was GIGANTIC and BEAUTIFUL.  It was easily the most amazing church I’ve ever seen.  We listened to the Rick Steves’ podcast and then wandered around.

Then we headed up to the dome.  We had to wait in line for what felt like forever.  Then we finally made it.

Then we headed to eat lunch.  We were both STARVING.  I had a spicy penne dish… it was the best pasta I’ve ever had.  Then we headed to the vatican museum and the sistine chapel.  We kind of had to hurry through it, and I wish we would have had more time, but we had to make it to the sistine chapel!  It was breath taking.  We listened to Rick Steves’ podcast again and took in the amazing paintings.  Naturally, we couldn’t take pictures, but trust me, if you go to Rome, don’t miss the sistine chapel. 

Then we got more gelato and did Rick Steves’ night walk across Rome, which ended at the Trevi fountain.  I’ve been to Ceasar’s palace in Las Vegas, and I thought of it when I saw the Trevi. haha.

We grabbed bruschetta, pizza, and gelato for dinner, headed back to see the Trevi in the dark, and again, we were exhausted, so we headed back to the hostel to sleep.

Rome- Day 1

So, I’ve been home for almost two weeks and I still haven’t finished posting about all my trips.  My friend Brittany FINALLY posted pics from Rome, so here we go!

For my last trip in Europe, we went to Rome.  This was about a week after the Icelandic volcano erupted and we weren’t sure if our flights were going to be cancelled or not.  Luckilly, they opened up the Rome airport the day before we left!  We got there late, as our flight was delayed, but the hostel picked us up and we went straight to sleep.

The next day, we got up early to go see the ancient sights of Rome!  We went to buy a Rome pass (it gives you free transportation and free admission to two sights), but we found out it was culture week, and everything except the Vatican was free!  We hopped on the metro and headed to the Coliseum.  I was really surprised to see that the Coliseum is seriously in the middle of the city.  You can see it from inside the metro!  I was completely wowed by the Coliseum.

We followed the Rick Steves’ podcast, which was pretty good.  As we were listening to the podcast, we ran into our friends who were also in town!  We made plans to meet up the following day to go to the Vatican.

Then, we headed to the Forum.  I’m REALLY glad we had the podcast for this one because it is all just ruins.  Without the podcast we wouldn’t have known what anything was.

Then we headed to our first real italian meal… delicious! We both had gnocci… yum!  Then we headed to the Pantheon.  I think the Pantheon was my favorite ancient sight because thru the years it has been renovated and it looks basically like it did when it was built.

The place is gigantic.  Seriously.

We then decided it was time to wander the streets of Rome.  We got some gelato, bought paintings and wandered around.  I bought a painting of Piazza Navona and then we went to find the piazza.  It was adorable, full of street painters and surrounded by outdoor tables! 

Then we headed to the Spanish steps.  They were full of people and had BEAUTIFUL flowers.

Then we were exhausted and starving, so we got pizza and tiramisu for dinner and headed back to the hostel to sleep.

Ireland- Day 3

For our last full day in Ireland, we took a day trip to the Blarney Castle.  I wasn’t sure what to expect, I hadn’t heard much about it, other than it isn’t worth the trip because it’s too far away from everything else.  Alas, Brittany REALLY wanted to go, so we went. 

We got up early and went to the meeting place.  There were only seven people in our group and our tour guide was super cool.  We had a stop at a small town called Cobh (pronounced cove).  It was a cute little Irish town.  We got breakfast, including Irish coffee, which was intense, to say the least.

Then we drove forever to Blarney castle.  It was surrounded by BEAUTIFUL gardens.  Oh, did I mention it didn’t rain AT ALL while we were in Ireland?  The weather was absolutely perfect. 

We climbed to the top of the castle and kissed the Blarney stone!  I now have “the gift of the gab” which, if you know me at all, you know it’s not exactly something I needed. 

We spent the rest of our time wandering the gardens.  We stumbled upon the wishing stairs… the legend is that if you walk up and down them with your eyes closed; your wish will come true!

We hopped back on the bus and grabbed some dinner in a small town and then headed back to Dublin.  Since Ireland is famous for their bed and breakfasts, we decided to spend one night in one!  We had a little bit of trouble finding our bed and breakfast, but it was ADORABLE. 

We went back to the Temple bar area, found our Irish friends, and spent the night in a few Irish pubs until closing time.  We went back home, and slept in our super comfy beds for a few hours until breakfast time.  We had a DELICIOUS Irish breakfast (nice change from cola cao and a muffin in Spain), which included sausages, toast, eggs, beans, rashers, yum!

Then we made our way to the airport and got on our flight back to Madrid!

Ireland- Day 2

For our second day in Ireland, we went on a day trip to the Cliffs of Moher.  I’ve heard that the cliffs are beautiful and I was super excited to see them.  We got up early, and headed to the meeting point for the tour.  We headed to Galway, because that is where the tour company is based out of and we had to pick up some more people.  We were exhausted, so we both slept most of the way to Galway.  Once we got to Galway, they switched bus drivers and we were off.  Pretty much the whole time we were headed to the cliffs, we were on tiny little windy roads where the bus driver had to pull off to the side to let people pass.  Our driver told us funny little Irish stories as we passed various run-down castles, churches, and crosses.  Occasionally he let us out to take pictures. 

Then we stopped in Doolin for lunch.  We had some delicious seafood chowder, and then we were off to the main attraction.  The cliffs were amazing.  I don’t even know how to describe them, so here’s a bunch of pictures:

We made a few more stops on the way home, more churches, crosses, and something about fairies that I don’t really understand.  We got back to Galway and had dinner.  We ate beef and Guinness casserole because it is a typical Irish food (according to our friends)… it was actually REALLY good.

We got back to Dublin and went to sleep because we were exhausted and we had to get up early again the next day.

Ireland- Day 1

So, we were home for school for a day after Semana Santa, and then it was back to traveling.  This time to Ireland!  Ireland was the trip I had planned that I was most looking forward to.  I don’t know why, but I’ve ALWAYS wanted to go to Ireland.  We got there with no problems, found our giant hostel, and went to bed because it was late. 

We woke up the next morning, ate breakfast at the hostel, and we were off to explore Dublin.  Naturally, since we were in Ireland, I wanted to see St. Patrick’s cathedral.  We made it there and paid to get in, and the people were SUPER nice.  It was a self-guided tour, but one of the workers explained the map to us and then told us if we had any questions we could ask.  It was much more like Westminster Abbey than a Spanish cathedral. 

After St. Patrick’s we went in search of the Guinness Storehouse, or as a tour guide later called it, the center of the universe.  It isn’t actually used as a brewery anymore, but it was still cool.  We learned how they make Guinness, and then saw a ton of advertising stuff.  Once we were done with our tour, we got a free pint!

We grabbed lunch at a little pub, and headed to Dublin Castle.  It is actually now a palace, because the castle was burned down, but they kept the name.  It was a much more practical palace than the royal palace in Madrid or Versailles.  It was the best and cheapest guided tour of a place I’ve ever been on. 

Then we headed to Trinity College.  We were trying to decide if we wanted to spend the money to see the book of Kells or not, but the library was already closed, so it didn’t really matter. 

Then we wandered to the Temple bar area… which was full of entertainment.  There were people dressed as leprechauns, street musicians, and tons of people.  We went back to the hostel to figure out where we needed to meet for our day trips the next two days, and then we wandered O’Connell Street, and we headed back to the Temple bar.  We ended up meeting some Irish friends who told us a whole bunch of stuff about Ireland, it was really cool. 

 At first they were really hard to understand because their accents were really thick, but once we got used to it, we were good to go.  Minus the fact that they say weird things like… 10:30 = half ten, 3 = tree, puck = punch, etc.  We stayed out till about midnight and then headed back to the hostel to sleep!

El Pais Vasco- Day 4

When we planned our trip to el pais vasco, we were planning on spending a day on the French side of the area.  We went to try and find bus/train tickets, and they were all really expensive, so we decided to spend our last day in San Sebastian.  Naturally, we slept in because we could.  The sun was shining and the birds were chirping, so we went to the beach! 

We went to one of the beaches and watched surfers and took in the sun, and then we got the brilliant idea of going to buy cheap towels and lay out! We went to the first Chino shop we could find and bought the cheapest towels and went back to the hostel to put on our swim suits!  We grabbed some pintxos for lunch and then headed to the other beach in town.  Then we realized, it was WAY too cold to lay out in our swimsuits.  Brittany only lasted about 15 minutes and I only 30. 

We put our clothes back on and lounged around the beach.  Brittany slept, but I people watched.  There were tons of people.  Some were sleeping, some were playing soccer, others cricket, and there were tons of little kids! And for some strange reason in Spain, its completely OK to let your child run around naked on the beach.  I would NEVER do that, but whatever.

After we were done with the beach, we wandered around the other part of town we hadn’t visited yet and found a cute little park. 

We got more pintxos for dinner and then went to watch the sunset at the beach.  It was beautiful. 

The trip to San Sebastian was pretty relaxing (aside from the crazy transportation/lodging incidents), which was exactly what I needed.

El Pais Vasco- Day 3

My friend Brittany is *FINALLY* catching up with some picture posting, so I can continue my blog!  I left off with my third day in el Pais Vasco.

It was Easter Sunday, and we were going to get up early and go to church, but after the stress of the whole bus situation from the night before, we decided to sleep in.  We grabbed a quick breakfast and wandered around the town for a while and went to find the churches to take some pictures.  Luckily when we got to one of the churches, mass was starting!  We stayed for mass and I can honestly say it was the coolest church I’ve ever actually attended mass in.

It was finally sunny, so we spent some time wandering the beach area and part of the town we hadn’t been to yet.  We took some pictures by the beach, and then headed up to the mansion that is in town.  There were so many beautiful flowers I took a ton of pictures until… MY CAMERA BROKE.  I thought I was going to break down crying in the middle of San Sebastian.  But I didn’t.  I just said well, there’s nothing I can do about it, and I’m hungry anyway, so let’s go find some food.

We continued wandering into new parts of town and found a bar to get some pintxos for lunch.  We pretty much spent the rest of the day chilling and wandering around the town until we got hungry for dinner.  We decided we wanted to go on a big pintxo outing for dinner.  I know I’ve mentioned pintxos before and said that they’re the basque version of tapas.  If you know me, you know I love tapas, but I LOVE LOVE LOVE pintxos.  San Sebastian is known for its food, it has the most Michelin rated restaurants per capita in the world, and even though we didn’t go to any Michelin rated restaurants, you can find good food anywhere there.  I also love that most of the pintxos are on display, so you go up to the bar, point at/ grab the one you want.  Brittany and I spent hours of this trip just going from bar to bar seeing what each place had.

At the first stop on our pintxo outing, we were trying to decide what to eat/discussing what we thought the things were.  I was trying to explain to Brittany what these little black things were (that Mom, Jenny, AJ and Rena all ate when they visited).  I knew I liked them, but I had no idea what they were.  An American guy was standing next to us, and he told us they were blood sausages. Oops. Sorry guys.  You all ate blood sausage.  The guy ended up joining our little outing, which ended up being a whole lot of fun!  We were introduced to the sparkling wine el pais vasco is known for, txacoli.  I love pinxtos and txacoli.   Once we were full and tired, we headed back to our hostel for bed.

The Final Stretch

Well, I got back from Rome yesterday, so I’m officially done traveling in Europe.  We may go to Madrid a couple times in the next 2 weeks, but that’s like going from my house to KC, so it doesn’t really count. 

Sorry I’ve been slacking on my blog again, since my camera died in San Sebastian, I’m waiting on my friend Brittany to post pictures on facebook.  She has a bunch of presentations this week, so don’t expect anything till late this week/next week at the earliest.

Looking back on my trips, I can’t believe every where I’ve gone.  I’m probably the luckiest person ever. I’ve offically been to 6 countries on this trip.  That doubles the number of countries I’d been to prior to this trip.  I’ve also been to the three biggest churches in the world: St. Peter’s, St. Paul’s, and the Cathedral in Sevilla.  I’ve climbed more stairs in monuments than I could have ever imagined.  I didn’t go to one city I disliked, but of course there were things I liked and disliked about each city.  Here are some of my favorite things for each city:

Alcala: FREE tapas, my host family and my friends

Madrid: Retiro Park and the Royal palace

Sevilla: Gardens at the Alcazar, the Cathedral, and the people we met at our hostel

London: Sister Act, Borough Market and National Gallery

Paris: Versailles, Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame stained glass, Orsay Museum, Il de la Cite

Galicia: Santiago de Compostela cathedral and the coast in A Coruna (and of course AJ being here)

Barcelona: Parc Guell, Sagrada Familia, and getting to travel with Jenny and Mom

Pais Vasco: Pintxos, beaches, the Guggenheim

Ireland: the people, Cliffs of Moher, Blarney Castle gardens

Rome: the food, Colosseum, the Trevi fountain, St. Peter’s Basilica, the sistine chapel

Favorite city overall: Rome.  It has a great mix of history, culture, and shopping.  The food was amazing and the people were super nice!

Favorite city in Spain: Sevilla.  It was beautiful.  Perfect first trip

Favorite country: Ireland.  Dublin was cool, but didn’t get my favorite city because what really made our trip to Ireland was going to the country and seeing the natural beauty of the country

I can’t believe I’m almost finished with my time here.  It has gone by so fast… I come home in 12 days, so you people in KC better get ready!! )

El Pais Vasco- Day 2

The second day we were in el pais vasco, we decided to go to Bilbao.  I REALLY wanted to go to Bilbao because I wanted to go to the Guggenheim museum.  Brittany slept in, but anyone who knows me knows I always get up early, so again, I wandered around the town by myself in the morning.  We were right in the center of the old part of town, where everything was happening, and it was nice out, so I enjoyed myself.  Once Brittany got up, we went to the bus station and got on a bus to Bilbao.  It was about an hour bus ride, and it was BEAUTIFUL.  Green hills, cute little houses, I loved it.

We got to Bilbao and walked towards the Guggenheim.  I was extremely surprised at how modern Bilbao was.  It is definitely the most modern city I’ve been in since I’ve been here.

We made it to the Guggenheim without any problems.  It’s a really weird looking building, so it sticks out pretty well.

We got in for cheap (love those student prices) and they had a pretty good free audio guide.  I’m usually not a huge fan of modern art, but this place was awesome.  They had quite a few rooms of modern paintings, but they had some really interesting stuff too.  They had this room that was full of HUGE spiraly things made out of metal that you could walk in.  In each of the shapes, the walls were slanted differently, so you got really weird feelings from them.  Some of them felt like they were going to fall over on you, and some of them made you feel like you were walking sideways.  It was weird.

They have always have two exhibits that change, and the two they have now are really cool.  One of the exhibits is on Anish Kapoor.  His name didn’t sound familiar to me, but he’s the guy who designed and built the bean in Millennium Park in Chicago.  His art was WEIRD.  We were only allowed to take pictures in certain parts of the museum, so I only have one picture of his stuff. 

A lot of his works in this exhibit were made of wax.  For example, one of his works was a cannon, from which every 20 minutes, a worker shot a big chunk of wax towards the corner of the room.  It was really cool actually.  We weren’t exactly sure if they cleaned it up at the end of every day or just accumulated the wax forever, but it was interesting none the less.

The other exhibit, I can’t remember who the artist was, but he made what he called gluts.  He basically took left over trash (old road signs, car parts, hoses, etc) and put them together into artwork.  Again, it sounds weird, but it was actually really interesting.

There were also lots of cool statues outside the museum, including a giant dog made of plants. Its name is puppy.

After leaving the Guggenheim, completely satisfied, we headed to find some dinner, but along the way, we ran into a semana santa parade.  Semana Santa = holy week.  And they do it big in Spain.  They have parades on Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.  This parade was bigger than the one we saw in Barcelona.

After the parade was over, the guys in the parade take all the flowers off the float and give them out, so Brittany and I got flowers from the float!

We realized we should probably start heading back to the train station to catch our bus.  We grabbed some sandwiches on the way.  We got to the train station, found out where our bus was going to be, and waited.  A bus showed up, and we tried to get on it, but the bus driver told us our tickets were for a different company.  We waited for a while, and then we were concerned, so we started asking other people where they were going.  It seemed like no one was going to San Sebastian, and some lady told us the bus had already left.  Well, we had gotten tickets to come back on the last bus of the night, so we thought we were stuck in Bilbao.  Brittany stood in the LONG line to talk to the ticket person, and I wandered from bus to bus asking where they were going.  Most of the buses were done running for the night, so I kind of started to panic.  About 20 minutes after we were supposed to leave, our bus showed up.  I’d never been so happy for a bus to show up late.  We made it back to San Sebastian fine, and we went to our hostel and went to bed.